


Soulbound Oneshots: Memories

by Griffinswings



Series: Soulbound [2]
Category: Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls Online
Genre: Child Abuse, Gen, Implied Violence, Implied pedophilia, implied rape
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-13
Updated: 2018-03-22
Packaged: 2018-12-01 20:56:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11494593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Griffinswings/pseuds/Griffinswings
Summary: A series of memories from D'tannen's perspective of his early upbringing in Malacus's vampire sect of Mannimarco's Worm Cult. Short chapters, dark overtones.





	1. Age 3

 

He could remember the smoke. The blaze throwing light on the tents, brightening the sky like the rising dawn.

There were shouts from voices both familiar and not-- screams of panic and anger.

He was being picked up and carried out into the blinding firelight. There were bodies everywhere. The smell of blood and ash filled the air around him.

He was being pulled from her arms now, wrenched between the grip of someone tall and foreboding and her fierce protective grasp.

Something hit her from behind and her hold loosened. He heard her scream for him to run. To get away, but he was stuffed, flailing into a sack and hoisted up.

When he could see again, it was still dark. He was yanked unceremoniously from the bag and dropped onto the hard stone floor of a daedric ruin. His bloodied palms scraped the ground frantically for purchase as he scrambled away from his captor.

One side of the room was lined with crossed bars too tight to climb through. The cave-like walls led to a single door where the large figure exited.

There were beds, books… other children, young like him. They were dressed in matching black frocks and all seemed quite alarmed at his arrival.

It was not long before others joined him, each tossed out of bags like he had been. Each looking just as dirty and frightened as he was.

After their captors had left, one of the boys in the black frocks approached. He looked no older than he was himself.

He put out a small hand.

“Cohda.”

He took it and stood up.

“Cohda?” he asked.

“My name. It’s Cohda.” the boy replied.

“Mine’s D’tannen.” He answered.

Cohda smiled comfortingly.

“We’ll get you cleaned up.”


	2. Age 6

He was going to die.

He was going to die, he was going to die, he was going to die.

His small fists shook at his side as he let his tears flow freely down his cheeks. What did it matter if he was seen crying now? It wouldn’t matter anyway.

The master’s second in command, Karinoore, stood before him, shouting words he no longer could hear.

How could he have been so foolish? Starvation was his punishment. One week with no rations for failing to produce a fireball spell in the pit. He should have counted himself lucky to have not been left to her durzogs.

But to steal food from the pantries on day five…

He wanted to throw it up on the spot.

It was just a bit of bread-- the staled edge of a loaf that would have been tossed in the refuse anyway. They wouldn’t miss it.

But, that wasn’t the point.

He had deliberately avoided his punishment. And that marked him delinquent twice.

Karinoore hit him across the face bringing him back to his senses. She held the last bit of the bread in her clenched fist, shaking it before his eyes.

“Answer me! This was under your pillow. You have no excuses. Do you know what this means for you, whelp??”

To his surprise, Cohda cleared his throat from the bunk above his own.

He shifted his legs over the edge and hopped down, looking guilty.

“You had better have a damned good reason for interrupting this, Cohda.” Karinoore snarled.

He mumbled something under his breath before clearing his throat again and repeating more loudly.

“It was me.” he said. His voice wavered.

D’tannen’s mouth fell open.

“What did you say?”

“I stole the food. I thought I deserved it. I couldn’t finish it and wanted to save it for later. I knew it wouldn’t be allowed, so I stowed it in D’tannen’s pillow so he would be punished instead. But it was me.”

He spoke with such certainty that for a moment, D’tannen almost believed him as well.

“Cohda, I’m ashamed of you.” Karinoore said, her face softening from rage to disappointment. “You had done so well on your last fight, you could have asked, but no… you had to steal from Master Malacus.”

D’tannen watched helplessly as Cohda was gripped by the wrist and dragged toward the doors. A sigh of relief escaped his lips as they went past the ritual room and into the torture chamber.

He climbed back into his bunk slowly and curled himself under his covers.

He couldn’t sleep the rest of the night, though his other comrades slept soundly through Cohda’s screams.


	3. Age 10

“D’tannen! Get back here!” Cohda whispered frantically, waving from behind the doorframe to Master Malacus’s office.

D’tannen smirked. Hadn’t it just been Cohda calling him a coward? Saying that he didn’t have the guts to even stand in the master’s office?

He ignored Cohda’s pleas and continued his crouched sidling along the wall. They were alone. The other children were out at training or in the mess hall. There was no real risk.

“I take it back— you’re going to get caught!”

“I’m braver than you, looks like.” D’tannen hissed back.  

He was almost there— just a few steps forward and he could reach it. 

“D’tannen…” Cohda whined lowly. 

But he had done it. He reached out a hand and planted it palm-down on the back of Malacus’s arched wooden chair. 

He turned back, a grin spread across his face, hand still pressed to the cold wood. But Cohda had disappeared. 

“You son-of-a—” he started.

“Now what have we here?” spoke a voice from behind him. 

A chill ran up his spine. 

Master Malacus.

He turned, holding back a violent tremor. 

“Surely, D’tannen, you are aware that my office is out of bounds at all times…” he spoke languidly, his voice low and disappointed.

“Yes, Master…” D’tannen said, bowing his head and looking at his boots.

“And surely you know the punishment for flagrant disregard for our home’s boundaries?”

D’tannen paused, afraid to answer lest he describe a punishment more harsh than what Malacus had in mind. 

Malacus led D’tannen from the room and toward a new door. D’tannen had seen his peers enter this room only occasionally, and when they did they disappeared for days or more. 

His hands trembled at his sides, but he balled them into fists. 

Malacus stepped out of the way and let D’tannen walk before him. 

The room was dark. Almost pitch black, and there were several coffin-like holes in the ground, each with a wooden lid and small slots into the open room. 

He froze, his feet edging backwards, but Malacus put a firm hand on the boy’s back and pushed him forward. 

“Do not make this more difficult than it needs to be.”

His heart hammered in his chest, his breath coming in stronger gasps.

“Please, m-master… Please… Don’t kill me!”

Malacus took D’tannen by the back of the neck, causing the boy to seize up at the shoulders. He pushed him forward until he tripped into one of the holes, scraping his knees on the bottom with a yelp. He turned just in time to see Malacus’s silhouette before him, on one knee, a finger to his mouth.

“Quiet now.” He said, pressing D’tannen’s shoulder down until he was flat on his back. 

The lid to the box closed with a snap mere inches from his nose. 

Panic instantly set into his body, and he flailed his limbs in every direction only to be met with a solid surface.

He was boxed in. He was utterly trapped, and the dim light shining through the slots was fading.

“Master, please!!” D’tannen begged now, pounding on the lid. “Please!! Help me!!”

“I’d be happy to help,” Malacus’s voice called through the cracks in the board above him. 

“Once you’ve learned your lesson.”


End file.
